Blanket update

Wow. It's nearly done. All the pieces I have are edged, and more than half have been put into the blanket and the ends woven back in. I only have 22 more to attach, and those will be done in the next few days. When I see my mom this weekend, I'll be able to show her a finished blanket. And then we bundle it up in the bag, pop it in a box with a letter and off it goes.

I'm eager to see it finished and amazed to see how far it has come since December, when I first set out to do it. I think somehow I thought it would grow faster, or perhaps that it wouldn't take off at all. I certainly didn't imagine that it would become a source of comfort for me, as I sat working on it. I'd pictured it as somehow magically coming together and being wonderful for my dad. The reality, though, has been better.

I've sat up nights with this thing, letting the worry flow into the stitches, at first praying only for my dad, but later praying for all the people whose lives he's touching as he's out there. Thank you, Rae, for seeing that so clearly and helping me to see it. I've put in squares from friends, family, and even one woman who knows my parents but doesn't know me. There's one square to go in today that was brought to America by a friend's grandmother. I've prayed over it, and sat under it as I worked on it. One woman who saw me working on it in public asked me what I was doing and when she heard, said a brief prayer over it.

I'm going to miss it when it's finished, even though I already have my next project sitting in a project bag ready to go. (I'm doing a lap blanket for the folks who are returning wounded.) There are even a few stitches in that next project already from a day when I'd gone out without realizing that my backup skein for Dad's blanket was sitting at home in a different project bag. This project currently occupies 2 project bags, down from a high of 3 a couple weeks ago. When it is finished, it will have a home-sewn duffle to make it easier to carry.